http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/fathers-expand-role-as-shared-parenting-rises/2007/03/26/1174761379917.html

Fathers expand role as shared parenting rises
By Dewi Cooke

March 27, 2007, The Age (AU)---More separated or divorced couples are embracing shared parenting arrangements while increasing numbers of fathers are taking on the role of primary carers, Child Support Agency figures show. Although women are overwhelmingly responsible for the bulk of care after relationship breakdown, the figures show that about 21 per cent of new cases in 2006 listed fathers as the primary care giver. This compares with 7.5 per cent of all cases in 1997.

Parents who pay child support also appear to have more contact with their children than in previous years, with the number of those parents who see their children 30 per cent of nights a year or more doubling from 4.4 per cent in June 1999 to 9.5 per cent in December 2006. It is a shift that has been touted as the result of both societal and legal change.

"For me this is a shift from a one-home, one-family model to a two-home, two-family model. It's a recognition that where kids are kept out of the middle, having both parents involved in their lives is a good thing," said the Australian National University's Bruce Smythe.

In 2005 the Federal Government introduced changes to family law, which provided for, among other things, the establishment of "Family Relationship Centres", a presumption of equal parental responsibility at the start of custody proceedings and, except in circumstances such as family violence or abuse, dispute resolution before going to court.

The assistant general manager of the CSA, David Mole, said it was too soon to detect the impact of the legislative changes but the figures were a sign that attitudes in custody disputes might be evolving. "I think that it's pointing to some quite positive trends across the community as a whole and seeing some significant change in mums and dads playing more of a role in the lives of their kids," he said.

Kuppy Nambiar of CE Family Lawyers said the family law amendments had not necessarily removed acrimony between separating parents but rather recognised that many fathers had a role to play in their children's lives. "I think things are changing and it's certainly easier now for dads to at least make the application and feel that it's really going to be heard, but as far as the traditional family set-up is concerned it's still the mums who do the bulk of the care," she said.

"It is the new legislation but part of it is a social change as well, and obviously that's why this legislation has been brought in, to reflect that dads are more hands-on than they used to be."